


Gone, Gone, Gone

by 3bowtruckles



Category: The West Wing
Genre: AU, Because Josh is a clueless dolt and it needed fixing, How it should have happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 17:49:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10313702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3bowtruckles/pseuds/3bowtruckles
Summary: She's leaving.  And CJ had hit him with the clue-by-four, and she needed to know.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first finished fic. I've been reading fanfics in other fandoms since Usenet was THE thing (ouch), but I'm a newbie to all things West Wing, having avoided it until I needed a pick-me-up after this presidential election. I watched the last season when it was on, so I knew where it was going, but starting at the beginning (thanks Netflix!) and watching Josh/Donna develop has been amazing. And this wrote itself in my brain on an epic work commute this morning, so now I'm sitting at Starbucks trying to get it down before I'm late for a meeting. It was originally going to be more explicit, and I might write that scene at some point, but it felt right to wrap it where I did.

He watched his hand pause in the air above the door, and idly wondered how much longer he was going to allow his subconscious to dictate his behavior.  Shaking his head to clear the thought, he knocked briskly.  He heard footsteps, then a pause as she looked through the peephole.  And then the wait.  He counted the seconds in his head, hurting for what the thoughts of the person on the other side of the door might be.

 

He’d just gotten to “eleven” when the door opened, slowly, begrudgingly.  And just this one look at the stone-faced woman on the other side filled him up and completed him, as she always had, as he’d always simultaneously ignored and taken for granted.  She moved aside without a word to let him pass, as he’d known she would.

 

And this thought filled him with a renewed shame, shame that he’d taken her shadow of him for granted for so long, that he’d been content to let her stay in that shadow, that he’d been so selfishly focused on what she brought to him that he didn’t bring anything to her.

 

He stopped there, in the narrow hall, and thought for a moment about leaving again.  She put a hand out to stop him from running into her, but still stared emotionlessly without speaking.

 

She was never emotionless.  Donnatella Moss was a study in visual emotions, and a look at her was as reliable as a look out of the window to check the weather.  But he couldn’t read her tonight, and his heart sank even further.  But Josh had made a career out of saying what needed to be said, so he opened his mouth to begin.

 

And that was when all of the words he’d prepared fell out and landed, unsaid, on the floor with an ugly clang.  He couldn’t... he didn’t... he… run?  No, not run.

 

He closed his eyes and breathed, and when he opened them again, he looked into her eyes and knew what he needed to say.

 

“I talked to CJ today.”   
She still stared.  It was almost unnerving enough to have him lose the power of speech, but this was too important, so he pressed on.

 

“I talked to CJ today.  She told me that I’m in love with you.”  He waited to see the words in her eyes, on her face, but nothing came, nothing except the stone he’d been greeted with at the door.

 

“She said that feeling I had when I found out you’d been hurt, that one where everything in my world went silent except a need to be with you, she said that was love.  She said the feeling I have when you walk into a room and the sun comes out, that’s love.  She said the way I draw to you like a magnet when you’re near, that’s love.  She said that…” He faltered, breathed, and continued, “That the fury I felt when I heard you were leaving was actually hurt, and that was love.

 

“And I was so pissed at her.  How dare she try to get into my head, to tell me what I was feeling, to name things I’d never named.

 

“But after I’d thought about it for about 30 seconds, I realized it: she was right.  She was absolutely totally completely 100% right.”  He stopped again, waited for a reaction.  None came, and this engendered in him a desperation beyond any he’d ever felt, and in his worry, he gave up and began to babble whatever came into his head.  “Donnatella Moss, I am absolutely totally completely without a doubt in love with you.  For months, for years, maybe even my whole life and I didn’t know it.”

  
At that, the ice started to melt.  He could see it: one trickle starting to slowly trace its way down her cheek.  Slightly heartened, he continued.

 

“I have spent seven years telling myself that nothing was more important than the job we were doing.  I was wrong.  WE were more important than the job.  I’ve been so selfish, I’ve been an arrogant ass, I’ve been patronizing and autocratic and completely taken for granted that you would always be there.  And now you’re…” He faltered again, not wanting to say it, and then thoroughly embarrassed when his voice cracked as he uttered the words, “You’re leaving, and I still didn’t get it until CJ, god, *CJ* spelled it out to me.  I love you, Donatella Moss.  And I know that, that…” He caught his breath before he broke completely, “That you have to go do your thing, and I have to do mine.  I just…  I just hope…” Another long, shuddering breath.  “That when you come back, you come back to us.”  

 

He stopped and watched as her enormous expressive beautiful eyes filled with tears.  Slowly, he reached out and took her hand.  “Because… I’d really like there to be an ‘us.’”

 

Shaking, she threw her arms around his neck, buried her face in his shoulder, and wept, and Josh felt his heart and his horizons open as he wrapped his arms around her in return.  His world, his entire world, was right here with her arms around him, and he’d never realized it before.  The mists in his brain cleared, and he rocked her, murmuring into her ear like a chant: “I love you. I love you. I love you.”

 

Eventually he felt her breathing slow, and he drew her to arm’s length to look at her.  She stared back, her heart in her eyes this time, and he smiled as he said it again.  “I love you, Donatella Moss.”

 

The miracle was the lack of anger.  Not his Donatella.  She was the most open, giving, FORgiving person he’d ever met.  This allowed him to ask the question he’d feared.  “Will… will you let me love you?”

 

And then the sun came out.  He watched it rise on her face, and basked in its warmth.  Her smile was all the answer he needed, but she drew him close and punctuated her statement with a kiss.

 

It was amazing.  Time-stopping.  HEART-stopping.  She filled him at that moment, every empty space he’d ever had was filled with her, with the love she’d always given him and he’d never fully accepted.  He felt his soul wrap around her and knew that he’d never again be fully whole without her.  He didn’t need a ceremony, a ritual, recited words, he just needed this moment of her accepting, taking, completing him.

 

The kiss ended and they clung to each other until the standing became too much and they sank to the floor of the hall, still wrapped in each other.

 

“Donna?”

 

“Mmmm?”

 

“I love you.”  The taste of the words on his tongue was like an amazing scotch, heady and rich and leaving him yearning to say them again and again.  He could feel her answering smile curve through her body, but she didn’t respond.  So he said it again.  “I love you.”

 

Donna sat up and pulled away, positioning herself so that she faced him, her hands in his.  Her face grew serious again, and he waited, knowing this was it.

 

“I love you, Joshua Lyman.”

 

It was simply stated.  And perfect.  And the words tumbled out of him before he could stop them.  “Marry me, Donna.  Marry me, Donatella Moss, and make my world whole.  Marry me and I will spend every day of the rest of my life making your world whole in whatever way I can.  Please, Donna, marry me and be my beginning and my end and my soul and my conscience for the rest of our lives.”

 

She closed her eyes, but her face, her beautiful amazing expressive face had her answer written all over it.  Still, he waited.  And when her eyes opened again, he knew.

 

“Yes.  Yes, I will marry you.  I will be your soul and your conscience and your beginning and your end, and you will carry my heart with you and we will belong to each other.  I will marry you, Josh.”

 

And then they sat, grinning at each other like fools, because, despite all they needed to talk about, there was nothing left to say at that moment.  He was hers, and they were us, and the world was complete.

 

_ When life leaves you high and dry _

_ I'll be at your door tonight if you need help, if you need help _

_ I'll shut down the city lights, _

_ I'll lie, cheat, I'll beg and bribe to make you well, to make you well _

_ When enemies are at your door I'll carry you way from more _

_ If you need help, if you need help _

_ Your hope dangling by a string _

_ I’ll share in your suffering to make you well, to make you well _

 

_ Give me reasons to believe, _

_ That you would do the same for me _

 

_ And I would do it for you, for you _

_ Baby I'm not moving on _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ For you, for you _

_ You would never sleep alone _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ And long after you're gone, gone, gone _

 

_ When you fall like a statue _

_ I'm gon' be there to catch you _

_ Put you on your feet, you on your feet _

_ And if your well is empty _

_ Not a thing will prevent me _

_ Tell me what you need, what do you need _

_ I surrender honestly _

_ You've always done the same for me _

_ So I would do it for you, for you _

 

_ Baby I'm not moving on _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ For you, for you _

_ You would never sleep alone _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ And long after you're gone, gone, gone _

 

_ You're my back bone, you're me cornerstone _

_ You're my crutch when my legs stop moving _

_ You're my headstart, you're my rugged heart _

_ You're the pokes that I've always needed _

 

_ Like a drum baby don't stop beating _

_ Like a drum baby don't stop beating _

_ Like a drum baby don't stop beating _

_ Like a drum my heart never stops beating _

_ For you, for you _

 

_ Baby I'm not moving on _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ For you, for you _

_ You would never sleep alone _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ For you, for you _

_ Baby I'm not moving on _

_ I love you long after you're gone _

_ For you, for you _

_ You would never sleep alone _

_ I love you long, long after you're gone _

\--Phillip Phillips


End file.
